Conrad is the Interactive News Editor for the Telegraph. He writes about data and visualisations. Follow him on Twitter @Coneee.

Since the start of the Barclays Cycle Hire scheme two weeks ago, an army of coders, designers and interested citizens have been using the data published by Transport for London (TFL) to create a clearer picture of how people are using the scheme.

TFL is accidentally powering this volunteer movement with its functional but uninspiring live-updating map of the scheme. By publishing the location and the number of bikes available at each docking station without restrictions, TFL has enabled people — if they possess the expertise — to export and play with the data.

One person with more than enough know-how is Oliver O'Brien, a research associate at UCL's Centre for Advanced Spatial Analysis. As an "'after hours' project", O'Brien created a beautiful map (see it here) which shows — at a glance — how many stations are full, empty or somewhere in between. If a docking station is red, it's nearly full; if it's blue, it's nearly empty. A yellow or white ring indicates whether the station is completely full or empty. Simple and beautiful.

Speaking to me yesterday, O'Brien said: “I saw the cycle hire status map that TFL have made, and I thought there must be a better way to show the status of the docking stations across central London, without needing to click on each one”.

The data has also given birth to a mini-industry of iPhone and Android apps: at last count there are at least 7 apps in the iPhone app store dedicated to the cycle hire scheme, many of them released for free.

According to O'Brien, TFL intends to support this community by providing a “formal” and reliable interface to the data via the London datastore. With an army of volunteers waiting to deploy their imagination and skills to public data — see the live tube map for more volunteered innovation — TFL's open data policy is really paying off.